Magic and Magical Fetish

Magic and Magical Fetish gives a very practical and theoretical insight of the universal principles of magic, categorized in different techniques. Valuable for both anthropologists, Wiccans and occultists. The book deals mainly with primitive, or folk magic, and is one of the very few works ever published which describes wind making and rain making by magical means.

Alfred C. Haddon, was a University Lecturer in Ethnology at Cambridge. In this volume he divides magic into sympathetic magic, sub-divided in contagious magic and homeopathic magic, the magic of words, talismans and amulets, and divination. He also separates public magic from the private magic and describes magical training routines. Fetishism is dealt with in the last part of the book, mainly in the context of the magical loaded object and how it is used.

Alfred C. Haddon was the eldest son of John Haddon, the head of a firm of type-founders and printers. He attended lectures at King’s College London before entering Christ’s College, Cambridge in 1875. At Cambridge, he studied zoology. Shortly after attaining his Master of Arts degree, Haddon was appointed as Demonstrator in Zoology at Cambridge in 1882. For a time he studied marine biology in Naples. In 1883 he was appointed Professor of Zoology at the College of Science in Dublin. The same year he got married. Among his first publications were An Introduction to Embryology in 1887, and various papers on marine biology, which led to his being invited to go to the Torres Strait Islands to study coral reefs and marine zoology, and while thus engaged he first became attracted to anthropology.

On his return home, he published many papers dealing with the indigenous people, urging the importance of securing all possible information about these and kindred peoples before they were overwhelmed by civilization.

Read more about Alfred C. Haddon in the Post Scriptum of Magic and Magical Fetish.

Magic and Magical Fetish

‘Haddon was convinced that the hundreds of art objects collected, had to be saved from almost certain destruction by the zealous Christian missionaries intent on obliterating the religious traditions and ceremonies of the native islanders.’

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Despite a nowadays anachronist and disturbing perspective, the book has remained most valuable for students of the occult, especially those interested in demonology, voodoo, hoodoo and its roots, African magick and religion, witchcraft, the classes of African spirits, and of course the spiritual and magickal use of a fetish.